Isabelle – 18 Years Old

It’s hard to believe that my baby is turning 18 today.👩🏻‍💼 I remember so clearly when she was born – trying to envision the future – who would she be when she graduated in 2020?👩🏻‍🎓 It seemed completely far out then, like the Jetson’s (old person reference 👵🏻) and yet here we are now. Well, I am happy to report that I am really proud of her and know that if Robin was here too – he would be kvelling (Yiddish term – gushing) about her too.❤️ Of course, I never imagined there would be a global pandemic,🤮 we would be isolated in our homes and she would basically end school early without a prom, graduation or senior trip. (we will make that one up) 🥀 Funny how you can anticipate some things but not others – luckily though – the important stuff worked out OK.👌🏻 So, now that we are in lock down and it will be just the two of us celebrating her birthday, I wanted to share how special my little peanut 🥜 has been to me (and her dad)!

It was always our intention as a younger couple to have two kids because I always preferred symmetry. 👨‍👩‍👦‍👦 However, when it was time to make it happen … we just never pulled the trigger for a younger sibling. 💦 But, Robin and I never felt that we made a mistake and really enjoyed most of our moments raising Isabelle. 😍😍 There were a few that were less than awesome. 🤦🏻‍♀️👎🏻 One could say – she was not a cookie cutter kid but I guess no one thinks their kid is – do they?🍪 She moves to the beat of her own drum and that is something I always admired and still do about her.🥁

When Isabelle was a little girl, her Aunt Brandi bought her first baby doll. 👶 Isabelle, of course named her Izzy (that always cracks me up when I think back). She loved her American Girl and we owned an embarrassing amount of doll clothes, shoes, furniture and accessories. 😬🤫 The American Girl Corp.’s sales projections plummeted when she outgrew her dolls.📉 This would be her most normal childhood interest. As Isabelle continued to grow, she was curious about many things. She became obsessed with water buoys and Robin, being the resourceful parent he was, ordered a catalog and would spend endless hours taking her through the various types of buoys. ⚓️ She stayed engaged like he was reading her a storybook.🧚🏻‍♂️ We actually met someone whose brother worked for the coast guard and was in charge of water buoy maintenance. You would have thought Isabelle was told she was going to meet Beyonce.🎤 Marla (my childhood best friend) even made her a scrapbook with pictures of buoys. 📕

Isabelle’s interests quickly evolved, as most kids did, and we went through stages such as her obsession with North Korea🇰🇵 (she was way in front of Dennis Rodman and Trump), swimming and geography. While living in Harrisburg, PA , Isabelle learned to roller-skate and the rink became our hangout every weekend. She would spend endless hours skating figure eights and routines. ⛸She had a great coach and mentor, Cindy who encouraged her to compete. Isabelle was a staple in the roller rink and quickly gave back by helping to teach skating and assisting with Special Olympics. Also, in seventh grade, Isabelle joined the basketball team and that became a love for her all through middle and high school. 🏀🏀 This was a shared joy between her and Robin which was nice to witness as their bond grew by talking strategy and technique.👨‍👧

Fast forward to now, Isabelle has really matured and become a well rounded wonderful gal. 🙆🏻‍♀️ I don’t like to admit it but I learn so much from her especially in the last two years. 🤔 We have grown closer even though we are very different. She has so many great qualities and it makes me very happy that she is like her father – in the best way possible.😍 I feel very lucky and grateful to have her as my daughter and appreciate that she has been low maintenance and stayed on the straight and narrow. 🙏🏻 So in honor of her birthday and the incredible amount of time on my hands, I thought it would be fun to list my favorite and least favorite things about her (but you know even the least favorite things are pretty damn good). 🎁Wishing my beautiful Isabelle a very happy 18th birthday and a wonderful healthy and happy future. 🎉🎊 I am excited to see the next chapter of her life unfold and how she will contribute to the world.. 💌 Thanks for choosing me as your mom (you know you did!) 🎈❤️❤️

Favorite List of Isabelle

1. Funny and Smart – she makes me laugh and I am blown away with how knowledgeable she is about current events, global affairs etc.. 😃
2. Creative – she is clever and creates adorable videos, programming for BBYO, etc.. 🎬
3. Grounded – she doesn’t ask for much – not so materialistic – I have to beg her to buy a new pair of gym shoes that have a hole in them. 👟
4. Curious – she is fascinated with off the wall things – like when she went to Israel her favorite part was seeing country borders (everyone else likes the wall – not her).💡
5. Resilient – she has taken a licking and kept on ticking. She has had some setbacks in life including Robin’s death, has worked through them in a healthy way and has come out stronger on the back-end.💪🏻
6. Beautiful – inside and out – I love that she looks like her dad (but much prettier -ha) and she is a good person with a great morale compass.🤡

Not So Favorite Things about Isabelle

1. Bad Sleeper as a Baby/Toddler/Kid – I still remember those nights when I could not get that frickin kid to go to sleep. I lost major sleep time from 2002 – 2012. 😴🥱
2. Stinkbug Adversity – To this day, she can’t handle them and I have to be on call for pest control 24/7.🦟
3. Kitchen Clean-up – Our biggest fights involve her leaving the kitchen messy – drives me nuts and is my trigger. Everyday is the same argument – quarantine time is fun – not 🧹🧽
4. Cuddle/Hair Touching Avoidance – I always liked when my mom would play with my hair and cuddle me. Not this one – she runs out of the room like I have the coronavirus. 🧸
5. Freestyle Cooking – Isabelle feels following a recipe is lame and lacks creativity. I think cooking is craft and hate wasting food because of her aborted science projects without a recipe. 🛒
6. Tease – She makes the cutest videos and will show me once and then will not allow me see them again or share with my friends. There is one where she is dancing to this song when she was 10 and then now that was so adorable – nope I was only able to see it once. 🙊🙈🙉

All and all – not a bad list, even the not so favorite things are no big deal – except #4. 🧸 Ok gotta go .. I feel the need to go chase her down and give her a big kiss – talk to you later. 👄💋👄❤️